If you can't save him
by Shugs
Summary: John's last words get the best of Dean when the oldest Winchester realizes the true meaning of his father's warning and how it was not meant for him to hear in the first place...


Another short one written mid-season4

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If you can't save him...

Sam looked up as he heard the footsteps approach his hotel room door, stopping just on the other side as a single key was jammed into the lock. He couldn't help but swallow hard as he grabbed the keys to the Impala from the table in front of him and shoved them into his pocket. The last thing he needed was for his brother to realize why he had taken a cab back to the hotel instead of his beloved classic car. When the door swung open, he braced himself for what he assumed would be an agitated, irrational man.

He watched as Dean stumbled in, tossing the hotel key towards the small table by the door and missing it by more than a foot. When the key hit the floor, the other man instantly looked down to his feet as if he had suddenly dropped something but was not sure what that might be. Shrugging, he carefully shut the door behind him. He stood there for a moment, obviously drunk out of his mind as he put a hand against the wall to steady his steps. Sam took a glance at the clock on the wall, it was just past three in the morning, Dean had been at the bar for nearly seven hours; trying to drown whatever it was that was on his mind this time around.

"Heya Sammy, what are ya still, still doin' up?" Dean slurred, passing a hand over his face as he eyed his younger brother through the haze in his eyesight.

"What do you think?" Sam growled, getting up from his seat at the small table. "I've been waiting for you to come in, where the hell have you been?"

"You knew where.... where I was... you're the one who took my, my um, car and left me at the bar." Dean replied, pausing as the room in front of him suddenly jerked to the left. He put a heavy foot down to keep his balance and then continued to make his way towards the nearest bed.

"Yeah, cause you were drunk and you didn't want to leave with me." Sam hissed, watching as his older brother traced the wall with his hands. Dean hadn't drank this much in years. "I've been trying to call you for the past five hours! You should be in bed, resting."

"On my way there bro..." Dean replied, his hand grabbing the footboard as he walked around to the bed and dropped down on the worn mattress. The second his head hit the pillow, he could have sworn the bed started tipping to the left. He clutched the bed sheets not to slide off over the edge and let out a slight chuckle when he realized it wasn't the bed that was listing, it was the entire room.

"Dean, that's my bed." Sam growled, making his way over to the intoxicated man.

"They're, they're both the same..." Dean replied, releasing his grip on the sheets when he felt confidant he wouldn't slide off. "Sam, there's something, something I gotta tell ya... dude I love you, but not like you know, in THAT sort of way, but like in a brotherly manly sort, um, sort of way, well you know what I mean right? Right Sam? It'slikewewere nothingwithout eachother andweretogeth..."

Sam watched as his brother stretched out, his words turning to a stream of nonsense as he put a hand to his face. Dean hadn't been back to their room since the late afternoon, since they had stopped at the bar for what was supposed to be one drink. His pants were still torn and stained with the blood from their last hunt and Sam couldn't' help but wonder what the patrons had been thinking of his brother's scrappy attire. "C'mon, clean yourself up and lets get you to bed, we'll talk about it tomorrow..." He said with an almost fatherly tone as he grabbed his brother by the arm and pulled him into a sitting position. Sam knelt down beside the bed and grabbed Dean's pant leg to drag his feet over the edge.

"Sammy, seriously, I gotta tell ya something." Dean started, doing all he could just to stay in a sitting position.

"You can tell me in the morning." Sam replied calmly as he grabbed his brother by the shirt to keep him from falling back onto the bed. "Right now, you need some sleep.... You're drunk."

"No Sam, it can't wait till then." Dean continued, catching his younger brother's eyes. "I've um, been thinking about this and I think it's time I, I let you know..." He paused again as the spinning room in front of him suddenly came to a dead stop. "Dad was wrong."

"Oh yeah? about what?" Sam quietly replied, humoring his brother as he untied the other man's boots.

"Right before he died, at the, the hospital.... Dad told me that if I couldn't save you, I might have to kill you. Dad was wrong, I mean he knew what he meant but he got it wrong. He thought you were the one that was going to end up in Hell, he didn't know I would, what I would do for you. I switched places with you, to save your life, Dad thought .gonna, but you didn't, I did and I swear he..."

"Dean." Sam said, interrupting his brother's rambling. "What do you mean Dad was wrong?"

"What Dad said...." Dean started, putting a hand on his brother's shoulder. "He told me that if I couldn't save you, I might have to kill you.... But he should have told you that, not me. If YOU couldn't save ME, YOU might have to kill ME..."

"Save you from what?" Sam asked, reaching out once again to grab his brother by the shirt, keeping him in a sitting position.

Dean let out a slight chuckle. "It doesn't matter cause it's, it's too late, it's too late now and you can't do anything about it. If I would have known Dad told me what he was supposed to tell you, I would... uh." Dean trailed off as the room in front of him started spinning again. His hazy vision faded to black as he felt the hand that was keeping him up, push him down onto the bed.

As his brothers words circled in his head, Sam questioned the validity of it all; Dean was, after all, drunk out of his mind. But the Dean he knew would never just blurt out something like that, sober or drunk for no apparent reason. He brushed the statement aside for the time being as he continued to help the other man out of his clothes. By the time he had the open wounds cleaned and dressed, his older brother was out cold. Once he had him tucked in for the night, the trash can near by, just in case, he stepped out of the room for a breath of fresh air.

Outside, the moon was shinning bright, giving the illusion of a peaceful night but doing little to light up the darkness within. Sam walked out into the near deserted parking lot and leaned heavily against his brother's pride and joy. "Is it true?" He suddenly asked, feeling the presence approach him like a soft breeze.

"Hello Sam." Castiel started softly.

"Is it true." Sam repeated, glancing over to the angel that had joined him by the Impala. "Is Dean right about what Dad said and how it was meant for me?" When Sam didn't get an immediate response, his eyes drifted across the lot to the flickering light of the vacancy sign at the side of the road.

Moments later, Castiel let out a sigh. "Yes." He replied simply, his voice tearing Sam's attention away from the flickering light. "Your father warned Dean, that if he could not save you, he might have to kill you..." He paused as Sam caught his eyes, then continued. "But what your father did not know, was that Dean would trade his soul for your life, that he would be the one to end up in Hell, instead of you."

"So what he told Dean, he should have told me?" Sam asked.

"Yes." Castiel replied firmly. He watched as Sam pushed off from the side of the Impala, taking a few steps forward before turning to face him, trying to absorb it all.

Sam shook his head, he couldn't believe what he was hearing. Dean had carried those words as if he were carrying the weight of the word and now, he had realize that the warning was never meant for him to hear in the first place; the burden was not his to carry. It was no wonder he had been drinking so much. "Dean thought he had to save me from myself, from what he thought I would become..."

"I know what you're thinking, but this has nothing to do with the demon blood Sam, or anything you've gained from the dark side you possess." Castiel interrupted, his voice doing little to calm the other man.

"If those words were meant for me, then tell me what Dad meant." Sam was quick to reply. "I might have to kill Dean if I can't save him from what?" He started to pace as his mind raced with thoughts of what such a warning could imply. "Dean said it was too late..."

"It is too late." Castiel cut in.

"Then tell me, cause I deserve to know." Sam growled. "What was I supposed to save him from?"

"Hell." Castiel replied, watching as the other man came to a stop. "If you couldn't save your brother from perdition..." The angel suddenly stated, his tone of voice sharp. "You would have to kill him, to prevent him from breaking the first seal and starting the apocalypse."

Sam's heart hit the bottom of his stomach, even if he would have known sooner, he would not have been able to kill the man who had sacrificed his life, to save him. Now he understood why Dean had waited so long to tell him what their father's last words were. Surely his older brother had struggled with the very same thought, how could he kill the one person that meant the most to him. "How long has he known that the warning he heard should have been for me?"

"Only a few weeks." Castiel replied, watching as the young man before him started to pace once again. "When Alastair told him about the first seal, Dean pieced it all together."

"If the first seal is broken and there's nothing we can about it, why did you drag him out of Hell?" Sam asked, pausing in his steps as his eyes focused on the bed side lamp that was still lit in their hotel room.

"Because." Castiel replied quietly. "He started this war and he's the only one who can end it."

"Dean's not strong enough, he's not the person he used to be, he's..."

"Dean will be fine." Castiel interrupted, his voice cutting through the other man's sentence. "It's the role you're playing in all of this, that you should be worried about."

Sam turned on the spot, swearing under his breath when he realized the angel he had been speaking with only seconds ago was no longer leaning against the Impala; he was standing there alone. Castiel's words echoed in his head as he took a quick glance around the empty parking lot, they were only words, but they were burning him alive.

He passed a hand through his hair and let out a frustrated sigh as he made his way back to the hotel room and quietly let himself in. He took a seat on the bed, his eyes falling on his older brother who was still out cold, something he would surely regret in the morning. The warning their father had given Dean was a heavy burden for his brother to shoulder, but even if John would have realized he was the one who should be warned, he truly doubted the outcome would have been any different. He would have still died in his brother's arms, Dean would have still made a deal with the crossroads demon and he would still not have been able to save, or kill the Hell bound brother who had given up his life for him.

-Shugs


End file.
